The voluminous evidence taken at his trial shows that he was very slack in the critical days at the close of August; it is also certain that Bismarck duped him under the pretence that, on certain conditions to be arranged with the Empress Eugenie, his army might be kept intact for the sake of re-establishing the Empire[56].

The whole scheme was merely a device to gain time and keep Bazaine idle, and the German Chancellor succeeded here as at all points in his great game.

On October 27, then, 6000 officers, 173,000 rank and file, were constrained by famine to surrender, along with 541 field-pieces and 800 siege guns.
[Footnote 56: Bazaine gives the details from his point of view in his _Episodes de la Guerre de 1870 et le Blocus de Metz_ (Madrid, 1883).

One of the go-betweens was a man Regnier, who pretended to come from the Empress Eugenie, then at Hastings; but Bismarck seems to have distrusted him and to have dismissed him curtly.

The adventuress, Mme.